Gateway Communities: Norris, TN | UTK-MLA Studio Finals

To say that this semester has been grueling would be an understatement. My classmates and I have been yearning for our winter break. Among the many courses that we took (Planting Design, Urban Social Geography, Advanced Grading and Drainage, Intro. to Sustainable Design Thinking, and more) studio was the heavy weight.

My (Fall Studio Page) displayed the research from my personal works and that of my classmates. We were working with the Town of Norris, TN and Townsend, TN. Our topic for the semester was 'Gateway Communities'. This project had been in collaboration with the Knoxville Metropolitan Planning Commission and PlanET (Plan East Tennessee).

Our studio was broken into two groups. I had the opportunity to work with Whitney Tidd (second year MLA), Leah Sullivan (final year MLA student), Angelike Angelopoulos (third year MLA student) and Amanda Gann (graduate architecture student). They were a great team to work with, bringing a diverse amount of talent and creativity to the table.

We began our project by conducting inventory and analysis for a few weeks. We then took our findings and created an overall masterplan and guiding principles for our designs across the entire corridor. The last few weeks we broke off into individual projects that related back to the overall design.

Leah tackled materials, plantings, and signage. Whitney tackled the agricultural and resort district. Amanda and Angelike developed a solid core which analyzed visitor, commercial, and residential solutions. I had the opportunity to develop a smaller conservation community which was pared with an infiltration park.

Overall the project was a fantastic experience. Our studio Professor Brad Collett challenged us throughout the entire process and pushed us to explore a variety of solutions for each problem.

Last week we had the opportunity to present our findings to the Knoxville MPC and members of the Norris Advisory Board. Overall, we had a good exhausting semester. Watch for a release of my individual and group work later in the week on my studio pages and blog.

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I currently maintain a blog which features monthly firm interviews about their firm and specific projects in the Knoxville or near Knoxville area. Readers can also find information on photography, current trends in representation, or even social equality issues.